We are bombarded with info about nutrition and dieting and healthy eating — and it can get confusing.
Care 2 has compiled a list of five common misconceptions about healthy eating. Check them out and take another step towards living a healthy life!
— Misconception 1: If you eat healthy, you must be on a diet
“This one never fails to amaze me! Too often, the word ├óΓé¼┼ôdiet├óΓé¼┬¥ is confused with the concept of dieting. Most people equate dieting with deprivation, especially as related to foods they love. Whether you are at your ideal weight or trying to lose weight, eating healthy is NOT dieting. It IS eating a healthy diet, however, which is a proactive lifestyle choice. If you want to eat healthy, you are choosing to do so. You choose to optimize the way you eat to look and feel your best.”
— Misconception 2: Eating healthy is boring, tastes awful and is never satisfying
Truth be told, eating healthy can taste better…can be wonderfully varied…and can fill you up for longer periods of time than food that is unhealthy. Many individuals who make a long-term switch to a healthier diet swear that they don’t miss the unhealthy foods they once ate. Some actually find them distasteful and unsatisfying! As you eat higher quality foods, your cravings for those that are bad for you and lack nutritional value will diminish.
— Misconception 3: There is a secret to weight loss
There is absolutely no secret, no magic pill and no trick to losing weight. You are an individual with individual needs. As a result, fad diets and “secret weight-loss programs” may work for some, but not necessarily for others. Even still, those that find that these fad diets work…only do in the short term. Anything that seems too good to be true, often is.
— Misconception 4: You need to count calories to be successful
Although food journaling is advisable, it isn’t necessary. For the most part, calorie counting is a must for those people who don’t eat REAL food that is REALLY healthy. It’s when we eat unhealthy foods that we need to count and track what we ingest because we’re consuming a lot of empty calories that provide very little, if any, nutrition.
— Misconception 5: Eating healthy is difficult and complicated
Eating a healthy diet is not rocket science. It never has been and it never will be. Don’t tell the experts this, but you don’t need a degree in nutrition, a PhD or an MD to eat well. All you need is a basic, easy-to-implement framework that will demystify the realm of healthy eating and provide simple, common sense rules that are easy to remember and easy to put into action.
[Image via AP Images.]